5th Edition and the Female Demographic

[Dannyalcatraz]

I think you could wiggle out of the "masculinization" argument by claiming that it is imprudent to say that indistinct equals masculine, and by saying that the entire point of such a character is to force people to focus on the personality.

By the time you start defending the choice to do the Warforged as an unfeminine female against feminist critiques of "masculinization" or erasure of anything iconically feminine about the character as a "typically oppressive" elimination of the feminine from the character, the damage has already been done.

Better you simply not go down that path: showing a woman who still looks like a woman- attractive or not, young or not- and still kicks ass will be an easier sell in all ways.

 

[S'mon]

In addition, there is the oft-repeated testimony that many of the actresses, writers & other participants in the creative processes that give us the female friendly fare- including pure money types- that it was the crossover stuff that drew them in and helped shape their creativity. In a sense, you don't get Twilight without Buffy.

I agree. Not always a good thing IMO - in terms of TV, it is now primarily a female-oriented medium, as a man I find all those 'sy-fy' shows unwatchable these days. The quote you linked from 2005 was from the transitional period when men were going over to computer games and other entertainment media and abandoning TV, except some of the documentary channels. The situation has only gotten worse since, with very little drama, including sf/fantasy designed to appeal to men at all. It's a complete reversal of the situation in the '80s, when action & sf shows were designed to appeal to male viewers.

I guess the HBO stuff is a partial exception and reaction to that.

 

[FireLance]

I would actually take the opposite tack. What are the characteristics of the game (rules, focus, players) turn women away from D&D? What can be done about them?

Some of the issues that have previously been mentioned in this thread seem to be:

- Attitudes of male gamers
- Focus on optimization, and combat optimization in particular
- Too many mechanical options and "fiddly bits"
- Art (though it has been much better recently)

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I would actually take the opposite tack. What are the characteristics of the game (rules, focus, players) turn women away from D&D? What can be done about them?

I haven't heard any women gamers or non-gamers cite mechanical things as barriers to enjoying the hobby.

 

[jbear]

I am going to side with those who say it is not the game itself that needs to specifically cater to women in ordder to attract them to the game.

One reason for this is that I think that trying to define what 'all women' and 'all women gamers' want/find enjoyable in an RPG is about as useful as trying to define what 'all male gamers' and by extension 'all males' want/find enjoyable in an RPG.

Anecdotal evidence from my gaming group:

[sblock=A short history of how my gaming group began]
I really wanted to play D&D after years of having no fixed abode. Having settled down at last I rounded up friends for a 'boys night playing D&D'.

5 players and myself. Only 1 of the 5 had ever played D&D (OD&D with his bro who ran solo adventures for him where his characters were insta-killed in a variety of colourful ways by his account).

The initial idea was to rotate the gamenight from house to house and the wife at each house would be invited to sit in and run Hogart, the dwarven cleric. No... not sexist. Hogart the dwarven cleric was the character I would have wanted to play if I wasn't DM.

First night: Only 3 showed. 2 bailed by phone 5 minutes before game start time. I was gutted. My wife stepped in and took a character on (she had played with me before but never 4th edition which was brand new and shiney at the time) and I ran Hogart. The campaign began.

A player short, my wife came the next night as well, and our hosts wife ran Hogart.

My sister-in-law found out my wife was playing. Suddenly it wasn't a boy's night! She was furious! Why wasn't she invited? She joined the campaign the next weekend where our following host's wife also sat in as hogart. The idea of Boy's Night was abandoned in the dust where it belonged and the group grew to 6.

To cut a long story short, every wife who played wanted to continue to play on a more permanent basis. The group's size swelled to 'far too many' and soon rotations between spouses began while the other stayed at home looking after the kids or arrangements were made for the kids to sleep over at the house we were playing so both could attend.

Nearly everyone involved were RPG virgins. All had heard about D&D and were curious but had no idea how it actually worked. All knew about the notorious 'suicide/murder' incidents. All admitted being put off a bit by the stigma of 'those kind of people play those wierd games'. One woman was adamant she wouldn't be into it. She was hooked within 10 minutes and became the most fervant of my players in organising the next session.

Several of the husbands lost interest in time due to the lateness of the times we were forced to play and the length of the sessions ( a big group doesn't help that). Their wives happily took their seat on a permanent basis at the table.

We played nearly religiously every weekend. game time was 10.30 pm (after kids were put to bed, which is later in Spain) to 2.30-3am in the morning. They reached lvl 11 as the campaign drew to a close when me and my wife moved back to NZ a few months ago. [/sblock]

Cast:

Judith, my wife: Elven ranger: Loves RP, being saucy, and kicking ass in battle but from a distance where she doesn't get beat up on. No interest whatsoever in charcter creation.

Lele, my sister-in-law: Drow sorceress: Loves RP, being intimidating, coming to the game fully dressed up as her character, tactical combat, character creation. She is the person most likely to DM apart from me.

Mar (female): Hogart, dwarven cleric: Prefers exploration, puzzles, skill challenges out of combat. Got a bit bored feeling she always had to heal by the end. She wanted to pack mre of a punch in combat.

Elsa (female): Shifter two weapon ranger: prefers combat, loves getting up into the middle of things and going savage. Very direct and not so tactical. Would often instigate things with flashes of absolute RP brilliance both in and out of combat, and other times sit back and let others move the action. Very creative approach to problem solving.

Javi (male): Goliath paladin: Prefered combat. Not so tactical. An instigator when the group got bogged down with too much ovethinking a problem. Did not enjoy RP as much.

Each one of my players was totally different both in approach and playstyle. Which is my point. There were 2 other women that played in the campaign at different times and 3 other men. Their play styles/approach were equally as diverse.

Everyone that played agreed that it was a really cool, enjoyable game, including the 2 that 'lost interest'.

So, in my opinion, based on my experience, its not the game itself thats an issue, and i extend that beyond the issue of including 'more female gamers' amongst the ranks, to an issue of swelling the ranks of gamers worldwide in general. Its a stigma that surrounds the game with a negative aura of 'its something that wierd dudes like that play'.

I encountered that attitude when I returned to NZ a few months ago with my brother-in-law ( a hard core rocker (guitarist, drummer, singer ... hehehe and flautist. Jethro Tull style of course)) when I suggested we play. "That's a nerds game bro. i'm not playing a nerds game." It makes me laugh to think back to last weekends game (our third game now) where he was getting really annoyed becasue he had to keep interrupting his turn to deal with the kids. "Why does something always happen when its my turn!!" Ahahaha ... in short, he loves it!

Its the stigma we need to attack somehow. We need to change the attitude towards the game and those that play it. The game itself is awesome in ALL ... let me say that again, it bears repeating ... ALL its forms. And as many have already said, we the gamers can have a lot of influence in that respect.

 

[Dandu]

Damn, I've been scoring my captures all wrong.

I think Chris Hansen might want to have a word with you.

 

[S'mon]

I haven't heard any women gamers or non-gamers cite mechanical things as barriers to enjoying the hobby.

Barbie: "Math is hard!"

Yeah, in reality I've seen far more male gamers struggle with the math. Many seem blissfully unconcerned with their own lack of ability though, which seems much rarer with women.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

What I've seen is that, even if mechanical issues arise for womem, it doesn't hinder enjoyment of the game or hobby any more than it does for guys.

Take the Barbie thing- I had a female gamer at my table who was very challenged by math, and even with combat actions or what die to roll when...for an entire campaign covering more than a year.

And nobody minded because she RPed the living daylights out of her PC, and had a blast doing it. Quite simply, the mechanics didn't affect her enjoyment; her play was an asset to the table.

 

[arscott]

I think that a table where nobody minds difficulty with math is an exception to the rule. The only time I've seen a women driven away from the game table, a lot of it had to do with how impatient men at the table were when they didn't have a solid grasp on the rules.

That's not to say that I think women are less capable of handling the D&D rules than men. But I do think they're less willing to put up with the hassles of learning to be proficient (both in terms of the actual difficulty and the social stigma against noobs), then men.

D&D could improve it's appeal to women by improving its appeal to new players. And it can't take the shortcut of presuming familiarity with computer RPGs, because those aren't particularly popular with women either.

 

[Will Doyle]

I've played with women in my groups since I left school, and I have to say I find no real differences in playstyle to men.

When it comes to bikinichick art, the girls I've played with just seem to shrug when questioned about it. They're not really that bothered.

As somebody mentioned upthread, the biggest issues I've come across when playing with women has been with socially-challenged men.